Team roping’s Bach a rodeo warrior

Thursday, Dec. 5, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

SPECIAL TO THE SUN

Allen Bach is a decorated war hero on the battlefields of professional rodeo team roping.

At 39, he's roped at 18 National Finals Rodeos -- the annual championship event of rodeo -- and has won dozens of major rodeos sanctioned by the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association. At the 1990 NFR, with Doyle Gellerman on the heading end, Bach climbed from 15th to first in the world standings to claim his second world team roping title. His first championship came in 1979, when he also won the NFR average title.

If world championships were determined solely by experience, Bach would be a slam-dunk winner. He's a rare constant in the competitive world of team roping whipper-snappers.

"This championship means a lot to me because I'm competing against 25-year-olds," said Bach, a California cowboy who now lives in Toltec, Ariz. "These guys I'm roping against are sharp and their hand-eye coordination is great. So, I'm pretty proud of this one."

Eight times at the 1995 NFR, Bach and his partner, Bobby Hurley of Ceres, Calif., caught steers in less than 6.0 seconds. They won three of the 10 rounds, placed third in another, finished fourth in the average and took home $36,467 each. Their NFR success boosted Bach's season earnings to $81,658.

The young gun who charged Bach hardest for the heeling crown at the '95 Finals was 24-year-old Britt Bockius of Claremont, Okla. Bockius and his partner -- Gellerman of Nampa, Idaho, Bach's former partner -- teamed up for an NFR-record 3.8-second run in the fifth round.

"For a while it looked like there was no stopping them," Bach said. "When you get a click here and that karma gets going, it's a real advantage. Of course, we were rolling, too. We were going at it with them head to head."

Bach entered the Finals fifth in the team roping heeling standings, while Hurley entered fourth in the heading standings.

The pair started the '95 season slowly, dedicating much of their time to operating team roping schools. But by August, the two realized they were a little behind in the world standings.

"When Colorado Springs (the Pikes Peak or Bust) rodeo in Colorado) rolled around, it was far enough into the year that we started getting worried about making the Finals," Bach said. "So we had to change our game plan. We made a deal to really concentrate on just catching our steers instead of trying to rope fast. And we were able to turn it around. Colorado Springs was a turning point. We won it and then we got really hot."

The pair went on to win money at rodeos throughout the Northwest, New Mexico, Utah and Idaho to climb into the top five in the Crown Royal World Standings before the NFR.